James Patterson - The Christmas Wedding

GABY SUMMERHILL, fifty-four, teacher, mother of four, widow for three years, lives in Stockbridge, Massachusetts

CLAIRE DONOGHUE, Gabys daughter, thirty-five, married, lives in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina

HANK DONOGHUE, Claires husband, thirty-four

GUS , their son, fourteen

TOBY and GABRIELLE, their eleven-year-old twins

EMILY SUMMERHILL, Gabys youngest daughter, twenty-nine, lawyer in Manhattan

BART DeFRANCO, Emilys husband, twenty-nine, resident in neurology

SETH SUMMERHILL , Gabys only son, twenty-six, novelist, lives in Boston

ANDIE COLLINS , Seths girlfriend, twenty-four, commercial artist

LIZZIE RODGERS, Gabys daughter, thirty-four, married, works part time at Walmart, lives near Gaby

MIKE RODGERS, Lizzies husband, thirty-six

TALLULAH , their daughter, eight

TOM HAYDEN, fifty-four, owns a farm, former pro hockey player, grew up with Gaby

JACOB COLEMAN, fifty-two, rabbi at a temple in Stockbridge

MARTIN SUMMERHILL , fifty-five, Gabys brother- in-law

ONLY TWENTY-FOUR DAYS until Christmas, and this Christmas is going to be one you wont forget.

Need proof? I think I can give you proof.

I want all four of you to take a good, long look at the screen and your mom.

Everybody watching? Emily? Claire? Seth? Lizzie? Emily? You see anything unusual or, well, kind of stunning?

Okay. Let me turn around for youTurningTurning again.

Yes. Your eyes tell the truth. I have lost twelve pounds and several ounces.

Stop, stop! No worries, no frets or fears. No neurotic theories about my health.

Im not sick or anything like that. Maybe a little sick in the head. As always. Part of my charm.

I just gave up Ben & Jerrys Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough and the occasional beer before bedtime. And I banished mayonnaiselow-fat or otherwisefrom the house. And white bread. Dunkin Donuts for sure. It made me somewhat miserableand hungry. But it also made me thinner. And, I must admit, happier. Yes, Im happier than Ive been in a long time.

I needed a big change. Everybody needs a change. If you dont change, youre stuck in a rut.

I know that people around here always say, Oh, Gaby, you lead such an interesting lifeYou run that farm of yours pretty much by yourself. You write a food blog that isnt too egotistical or boring. You teach the local kids to read and write.

Oh, yes, I doand I love itbut honestly, it just wasnt enough for me.

I was in a life rut that was only getting deeper. R-u-t. Put on boots and a loden coat the morning after a snowstorm and trudge to the henhouse to collect four eggs. Start adding nutritional facts to the recipes on the blog and people you never even met accuse you of being a nutrition Nazi.

Teach English, or at least try to make the kids love reading. I know this is going to come as a bit of a shock, but most teenagers think that Great Expectations to use a phraseblows, but that any book with a vampire in it is brilliant. Especially if the vampire is darkly handsome and promises eternal love with every bite. Great Expectations does kind of blow, by the way.

So anyway, I promise you, Im not going through the dreaded midlife crisis. Im not even at my midlife.

And, hey, the first one of you who makes a crack about my being way past midlife gets tossed out of the will. Im serious, kiddies.

I do need some excitement, though. I think the wildest thing Ive done in the last three years is to ask your kids to call me by my first name. I disliked being called Grandma. Made me itchy all over.

Back to the subjectIve lost twelve pounds.

After all

I want to be able to fit into my wedding gown.

Anyone whos fainted should please get up off the floor. And dont start telephoning one another until this video is over.

Yes, you heard right. I said wedding gown. As in wedding. As in bride. As in wedding in our barn.

Youre looking at the bride right now, and shes actually smiling. Shes happy. Very much so. You know I dont complain, but there was a long, dark time after your father died and Im finally out of that black hole.

Youre probably wondering who the lucky groom is. Well, as you used to say when you were just little brats, thats for me to know and you to find out.

Everybody is coming home to Stockbridge for Christmas. Claire, Emily, Seth, and Lizzie. You and your children, your spouses, your lovers, dogs, cats, whoever and whatever. We havent been together as a family since your dad died.

So its Christmas in Stockbridge.

Then youll find out who the lucky man is. Till then. I love you. And Im so happy I almost cant believe it.

See you at Christmaswhen all will be revealed.

CLAIRE DONOGHUE, Gabys eldest daughter, had just finished her mothers video, and, well, wow. Go, Gaby! For the moment, though, Claire was paying her household bills, and bill paying was kind of like playing I love you, I love you not with hand grenades. Sooner or later, Claire knew, one of them was going to blow up in her face. In everybodys face.

I love you, South Carolina Electric and Gas, she said, placing that bill in the stack she intended to pay.

I love you not, emergency root canal.

It was as good a system as any for deciding how to parcel out their slim income to pay the usual fat stack of bills. It was only during the luckiest of months that Hanks money from construction work, and Claires income from tutoring, covered most of the bills. This was not one of those months.

Claire sat at a small, wobbly oak table in the chilly sunroom. She wore two Shetland sweaters in two different shades of dark blue, white painters pants, and fingerless woolen gloves. She called her style cheap cute. And, in fact, Claire was cute. Even after three kids, she was still holding her ownpug nose rather than spreading pig nose, smattering of freckles, short reddish-brown hair, girlish figure.

The truth was, though, she felt anything but cute; she felt tired and run-down. She felt like total crap, and nobody knew it, and nobody much cared.

James Taylor was playing softly on Claires laptop. She liked James okay, always had.

Ive seen fire and Ive seen rain.

Claire knew what he was singing about. She gazed out of the sunroom and although their house was three blocks from the beach, she could see a sliver of the gray December ocean. The sand was cold and the horizon lifeless. Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, was a summer hot spot, but for Claire and Hank Donoghue it was their year-round home. That meant that when the tourists left and the cheesy concession stands closed down and the splintery boardwalk was desertedwell, that meant that Claire and Hank were left with each other. And that wasnt always a good thing. Not for the past few years. And definitely not today. Hank just kept getting worse and worse and worse.

Hey, babe, she heard him call from his downstairs den. Can you bring me a big coldy-oldy tea and maybe-baby some Eyetalian crackers?

Claire knew he was asking for an iced tea and Pepperidge Farm Milano cookies. She also realized, from his ridiculous language, that he was stoned out of his mind.

In a minute, she called. She did not want a fight today. Or any day, really. She couldnt stand his blowups, but she didnt know what to do about them. The kids loved Hank.